The Maltese Herald has reached out to various high-profile individuals within the authorities an the Justice system to try and understand why there has been a very low amount of assets seizure in 2024.
The Asset Recovery Bureau has only seized up to €1 million in assets in 2024 compared to €18.6 million in 2023. The massive discrepancy in assets seized comes despite the fact that in 2024, a significant number of individuals were arraign in Court over the largest public fraud in history: the Vitals case. All of these individuals supposedly had their assets seized.
We find it preposterous that all together these individuals couldn’t mass more than €1 million while being charged with a multi-million Euro fraud case.
In the course of its investigation, The Maltese Herald has discovered many important points.
As mentioned previously, the head of the ARB is Anton Sevasta who was a close associate of Joseph Muscat and Keith Schembri. Sevasta was immediately employed by the Office of the Prime Minister in 2013.
The Asset Recovery Bureau signed a written agreement with the Police underlining its commitment to help the Police to detect and freeze financial assets from suspected criminals. The ARB also has agreements with foreign entities underlining similar obligations.
The Maltese Herald has confirmed with its sources that Anton Sevasta shows a great level of incompotence in his job which may also be intentional and aimed at undermining his own role. We have also confirmed that the ARB is making little to no effort in conducting investigations to produce financial ledgers of criminal aspects to eventually seize their assets.
We have also confirmed that the main hub for financial intelligence for the authorities, even with regard to asset seizures, remains the FIAU which also remains the least untainted financial regulatory institution.
The Maltese Herald could also confirm that the person within the Police who is responsible for going after the assets of criminal suspects is the head of the Financial Crimes Investigations Department Fabian Fleri. Previous members of the Justice system who now work in the private practice or have retired from public service have told us that Fabian Fleri has consistently refused to follow advice from prosecutors, refuses to take executive action on immediate cases, and has failed to act on many FIAU reports that were submitted to the Police.
On the other hand, a government source has told us that the government is not actively prioritising asset freezing because the government does not want to create “extreme” conditions that would jeapordise foreign investment, also citing Malta’s relaxed financial environment. We find this reasoning rather apologetic that also has an agenda to protect incumbent and previous politicians.
With all the information that we’ve gathered, our conclusive working theory is that the government does not want to ensure the proper execution and implementation of asset freezes because it may ultimately hurt politicians themselves who are accused of corruption. The consequence of this situation is that not only are politicians like Joseph Muscat getting away with it, but ultimately, Malta’s most dangerous criminals are also benefiting from it.
Website Editor
Historian and Publisher
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